Video shows police running over possibly rabid raccoon

By Associated Press | March 13, 2018 at 7:14 amUPDATED: March 13, 2018 at 7:22 am

COEYMANS, N.Y. (AP) — Video of upstate New York police running over a raccoon that was believed to be rabid is being investigated by the state’s environmental conservation agency.

Two videos posted to Facebook show a marked Town of Coeymans Police Department SUV and an unmarked vehicle running down the animal on Monday in a shopping plaza parking lot near Albany, New York. The woman who posted the videos says the vehicles charged at the raccoon for 15 minutes before it died.

Police defended the officers, saying they could not shoot the raccoon because people and businesses were nearby. A post on the department’s Facebook page says they killed the animal “as quickly and humanely as possible.”

A Department of Environmental Conservation spokesman tells the Albany Times Union that the agency is investigating.